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Sunday, May 29, 2005

Star Wars Episode III -- George Lucas' first comedy

I didn't have high expectations for the final prequal to the Star Wars trilogy and that was a good thing. It hurt less to hear Anakin and Padamei talk about their... feelings. Ugh. I think George Lucas gave up and decided to make a comedy out of his last film because I haven't laughed harder at any other episode.

Some memorable quotes:

*Obi Wan and Anakin run down a corridor in an enemy space ship when a shield blocks their way*

Obi Wan: "What's this? This shouldn't be happening, we're smarter than this! What do you suggest we do?"

Anakin: "I suggest patience."

*General Grievous and Anakin send some zingers at each other*

Grievous: "From your reputation I had assumed you would be much... older."

Anakin: "From your reputation I would expect you to be much taller." OOOOO! Would you like some lotion for that BURN?

There's more where that came from. The entire movie is filled with dribble that will bring tears to your eyes, laughing.We find out why the Emperor looks so pale and wrinkly, and it's not because he's old. Also, another funny joke is Jar Jar shows up ONCE in the entire movie in a funeral march for Padme and he doesn't say a damn thing. It seems Star Wars fans weren't the only people annoyed with Jar Jar, the entire cast of Star Wars has forgotten he even exists and don't mention him at all. Which is great.

*Spoiler Alert* Possibly the funniest moment in this great sci-fi comedy is the scene where Anakin and Obi Wan are duking it out on a lava flow. Obi jumps on to nearby ground and looks down on Anakin and proclaims "You can not win Anakin, I have the high ground." To which Anakin responded, "You have no idea how much my powers have grown!" Anakin then demonstrates just how powerful he has become by front flipping in Obi Wan's direction and, in mid air, gets three of his limbs cut off. BWAHAHAHAHAHA! And then his stumpy self starts sliding near the lava and sets on fire. Then he starts screaming and Obi Wan tells him off and walks away. This explains why the lightsaber duels in the old Trilogy aren't so fancy and elaborate. Vader fights stiffly because he's a robot and Luke learns his stuff from the worst, Obi Wan Kenobi.

What's amazing is that even when Anakin has become Darth Vader, he's still sappy. He cries ALL THE TIME. After he kills the seperatist leaders he looks at lava and cries. I won't mention all the crying done with Padme although he ends up force choking her which amused me immensely. That's why he gets a mask. Lord Sidious didn't care how ugly he got, he still showed his face. Darth Maul was ugly and he didn't care. Vader gets a mask because he cries too much and no one wants to see a Sith Lord cry. And when he finds out Padamei is dead he goes, "NOOOOOOOOOOO!" with his elbows touching his waist and arms spread out from that position, tilting backwards.

Yoda has a fight with Lord Sidious. His Kermit the frog tactics just couldn't stand up to Sidious going ape wizard shit on him with lightning and flinging objects. And Chewbacca makes an appearance. He doesn't do much. He didn't have to be in the film, but was there anyways just to say "GROWLLLUUUUR!"

Go ahead and watch this. Episode III is fun to watch no matter how corny it can get, and heck, it's Star Wars.

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Link to pointless waste of time

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy -- Douglas Adams is spinning in his grave

We all know book to movie projects can suck. Some are good though. The Lord of The Rings, Harry Potter, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (not that new monstrosity headed to theatres) and others I forget to mention. But God............ DAMN it did they screw up with The Guide. There's a love interest (the book didn't focus on love more than it needed to), the Vogons are turned into villains instead of just a miserable race of bad poetry writing slug people, and Zaphod Beeblebrox gets butchered in mind and body. The crazy and cool Zaphod is transformed into this over energetic Texan with a hidden third arm and a poorly placed second head (It's in his neck). It's almost as if the producers lacked the funds to animate the head during the entire movie... Ford is played by some guy, or at least that's how this guy came off as trying to pretend he was capable of playing Ford. He just sucked. Okay, look. I just looked the guy up and it turns out he's Mos Def. "Regarded as one of hip-hop's most introspective and insightful artists," (imbd.com). Jesus Christ, so they pick a rapper to play Ford Prefect? WTF?

"Hey, let's get Mos Def to play Ford Prefect!""Awesome idea Dick. While we're going out of our way to pick music artists to play high brow comedy characters let's get Ice-T to play Zaphod!""And then we can get Tom Waits to be Arthur Dent!""Rockin'!"

Of course this sci-fi humor classic is ruined by the physical humor that dominates the film. Any good lines from the book are gone. But boy oh boy, do people smack into stuff. Har har, shovels in faces and the ol' "Gimme a hand" and then the guy ends up getting a hand, literally. Trillian and Marvin manage to come through and not suck. Marvin was used well. Especially when he gets the Point of View Gun.

I say to everyone, avoid this movie. Be you fan or newcomer, neither of you will appreciate this film.